Loves Me Not
by Touch of Gray
Summary: Unrequited love was so beautifully tragic to a head in the clouds seven year old. Now it just looks painful. [Penelo, post game. One sided PeneloVaan. One shot.]


loves me not

The moon glitters off the ocean. Far away, off in the distance, I half-fancy I can see the Pharos. There's a little white glimmer. I pretend.

It's late, so late that even the Pirate-City has gone to sleep. There's a salty tang to the air, which makes sense, but isn't very welcome. I'm used to Rabanastre, to desert-clean, hot, dry air. None of this humid, fresh, sea-air that makes me feel like I'm choking sometimes. I don't like it here, but the view is nice. Especially the sunrise - comes up over the ocean, turning the water all sorts of pinks and oranges and reds, glittering diamonds on the waves.

It'd make a pretty painting, if I was an artist. Vaan draws sometimes, but he thinks he's horrible at it (which he is, but that's besides the point. At least he tries.) I think Fran must be a great artist. She seems like someone who could paint a beautiful picture. Or Basch, because it's simply so out of character for him. It'd be something he'd do in his spare time, when he's not being all Judge-Magister-y.

I wonder if Larsa can draw. I doubt it. He's too political.

Vaan is going to be annoyed with me when he wakes up, because I've been standing here watching the ocean for hours. I guess after seeing nothing but deserts and trees, you have to change the pace a little. I don't see enough of the ocean.

Makes me feel tiny. Like restoring Ashe to her throne really doesn't matter that much, because the world is so big, that a tiny kingdom with a larger-than-life queen won't change anything. For all of Dr Cid's talk about bringing the reins of history back into the hands of men, it doesn't do so much. History is history, you know. It's going to be whatever we do. Even if some spooky gods in dark clothes told us to.

The moon is full tonight, and the stars are all out, so it's pretty bright. This would be a nice night to be _with_ someone.

But he's asleep, and doesn't really notice pretty things anyway.

When I was little, I played that flower-game, the one I'm sure every little girl played. Where you take the flower and pluck each petal, one by one, he-loves-me-he-loves-me-not. I always got different answers, no matter how many petals I plucked. He'd love me once, then love me not another. I never seemed to get a consistent answer. All the other girls were getting he loves me, he loves me, he loves me while mine couldn't make up its mind.

I guess it fits, in a twisted sort of way. He loves me, then he loves me not. Sort of.

I mean, I don't know. He never says anything, or does anything. It's just what other people read for me when they don't know I'm listening. Things like _he's completely besotted with her, he's just too dense to see it. _It kind of makes me feel better. But it also kind of doesn't, because while Vaan's being dense and maybe in love (if Balthier is to believed, which he usually isn't) I'm watching the moon glitter diamonds off the sea, not sleeping, and certainly not sleeping next to him.

My brothers always teased me for my crush on Vaan. I think they thought he was gay. There was a rumor that went around when we were kids that he had a crush on some guy, but he kind of stared at me weird when I asked him about it and asked me where I heard that. Reks laughed himself sick when he heard it, and told me that his little brother _definitely wasn't_ homosexual, in a really _hinting_ way that I never let myself catch.

Reks was trying to tell me that Vaan liked me. _When we were seven._ Which means nothing now.

Or maybe it does. I can never decide. I think that was part of the petals thing - I could never decide if I wanted Vaan to love me, or not. Unrequited love was so beautifully tragic to a head-in-the-clouds seven-year-old. Now it just looks painful.

I guess we all grow up sometimes. I don't think we ever really grow out of our he-loves-me-not petal games. We can cover it up, but never get rid of it. I wonder if Ashe ever plucked petals over Rasler. Did she even know him before she got engaged to him? Was it one of those engaged-from-birth things, or did they run into each other and figure out they were royalty, or...

I'm a hopeless romantic. I know it. Always have been. That's why there's a flower between my fingers, losing its petals to love. The last petal is a loves-me-not, but it breaks off halfway.

Now, that's just cruel.  
---  
--  
-  
(A/N: I was in the mood for a little unrequited romance. Review!)


End file.
